Christiana Presnell
c. 1808–1870 · England to Tasmania
MY FAMILY CONNECTION
3rd Great-Grandmother
Arriving in Van Diemen’s Land as a child, Christiana connected two branches of the Presnell family through her marriage to Thomas Presnell Jr.
BORN
c. 1808
England
Arrived in Van Diemen’s Land
12 Jan 1821
Hobart aboard the Midas
DIED
3 Sep 1870
Ross, Tasmania
CHAPTER 01 · 1821–1824
A New Life in Van Diemen’s Land
The Midas arrives at Hobart on 12 January 1821 after a five-month voyage from England. The following day, the Hobart Town Gazette reported that Captain Watson had brought merchandise and 38 passengers. Among them was the Presnell family, including Christiana, whose 1808 baptism entry appears below.
Christiana Presnell was twelve when she arrived in Hobart with her parents and siblings aboard the Midas on 12 January 1821. Her father established the White Hart Inn at Sorell Springs, on the road between Hobart and Launceston. The inn offered travellers refreshment and accommodation, while John’s skills as a blacksmith served those making the long journey through the Midlands. This roadside settlement became the setting for Christiana’s teenage years.
The family’s connections stretched south to Black Snake, where Thomas Presnell senior operated another inn. In July 1826, Christiana married Thomas’s son, also named Thomas. Their wedding at New Norfolk brought the two Presnell households together and began the next chapter of her life.
CHAPTER 02 · 1824–1830
Two Presnell Families United
Christiana Presnell married Thomas Presnell junior at New Norfolk on 11 July 1826, six days before their son John Thomas turned two. John Presnell and Thomas Presnell senior witnessed the marriage.
Christiana was twelve when she came ashore at Hobart with her parents and siblings. She had spent her childhood in London, but much of her teenage life unfolded in the Tasmanian Midlands, where her father kept the White Hart Inn at Sorell Springs.
The Black Snake Inn, near present-day Granton, is the likeliest place for Christiana’s story with Thomas Presnell junior to begin. His family lived there, and a visit would have brought the two young Presnells under the same roof. Thomas had already been in trouble. In 1823, the newspaper reported that he had been ordered to keep the peace for three months after being charged with assaulting a constable.
On 17 July 1824, at about fifteen, Christiana gave birth to their son, John Thomas. He was six days short of his second birthday when she and Thomas married at New Norfolk. Her father John and Thomas Presnell senior both gave their consent and witnessed the wedding.
Now she and Thomas were starting a family of their own. Their son William Thomas Presnell would carry both branches of the Presnell family into the next generation of my family line.
By the time Christiana took John Thomas to be baptised in September 1827, he was three years old. The family was living at Black Snake, where Thomas was a publican. By then Christiana had a daughter, Harriet, and in 1829 she had another son, William Thomas. It is through William that I descend from Christiana. Soon afterwards, the family moved inland towards Sorell Springs, the district she had known as a girl.
CHAPTER 03 · 1830–1852
Raising a Family in the Midlands
Christiana Presnell walks with her children past the White Hart Inn at Antill Ponds as a horse-drawn cart approaches. The inset reports the 1834 inquest into the death of her three-year-old daughter, Eleanor Amelia.
Around 1830, Christiana and Thomas left Black Snake for the Midlands, where she had spent much of her youth. They may have stayed with her parents at Sorell Springs around the time her father, John, moved the White Hart business to Antill Ponds. When John died in 1831, her mother Eleanor carried on at the inn. Christiana and Thomas’s son George Frederick was born at Sorell Springs the following year.
In 1834, Christiana and Thomas’s daughter Eleanor Amelia was fatally burned at Antill Ponds. She was three years and nine months old. Her headstone in the Old Anglican Cemetery at Oatlands names both her parents.
After Eleanor’s death, her family still had ties to the White Hart property. By the time it was offered for auction in 1838, David Solomon was living at the inn as its tenant. The auction notice places Thomas on one block of land nearby and Christiana’s brother John on the next. Both blocks were partly under cultivation.
Christiana and Thomas lost two more young children in the years that followed. George Frederick died in 1839, and Samuel died in 1840 at just six months old. Christiana herself appears in the Oatlands birth register as the informant for Martha’s birth in 1841 and Mary Ann Dadge’s in 1844. Both entries record Thomas as a labourer. Three more daughters followed, Christiana, Diana Dadge and Ellen Elizabeth. By the time Ellen Elizabeth was born in 1852, some of the older children were already adults.
CHAPTER 04 · 1852–1870
A New Generation
Christiana’s son William Thomas Presnell married Emily Hill at St Luke’s Church, Campbell Town, on 16 September 1856.
Christiana still had young children at home when her older sons and daughters began raising families of their own. Ellen Elizabeth was only four when her older brother William Thomas married Emily Hill at Campbell Town. In 1856, her son William Thomas married Emily Hill at Campbell Town. They named their first daughter Emily, and in 1859 they welcomed a son, Thomas. It is through William and Emily that my branch of the Presnell family continues. Christiana’s daughter Martha also started a family of her own, marrying John Hill at Ross in 1863. Martha had two daughters before she died in 1866, aged just twenty-four.
Christiana died on 3 September 1870, almost fifty years after she came ashore at Hobart with her parents. She had arrived as a child. By the end of her life, her own children were raising another generation of the family in Tasmania.
CHAPTER 05 · 2026
A View From My Beer
A beer for me and a sherry for my third great-grandmother, Christiana Presnell, outside the White Hart Inn at Antill Ponds.
If I could share a drink with my third great-grandmother Christiana, I’d meet her outside the White Hart Inn at Antill Ponds. I’d bring my beer and ask what it was like to come back to the Midlands with children of her own, after spending much of her youth at her parents’ inn at Sorell Springs.
She was about twelve when she arrived in Hobart. I’d ask her when Tasmania began to feel like home. What was it like to grow up as a teenager in Tasmania?
I’d also be tempted to ask Christiana about the family scandal. She was about fifteen when John Thomas was born, and he was nearly two when she and Thomas married. How did both families take the news? What did Thomas say when he learned he was going to be a father? And when she looked back on those years, what did she wish someone had asked her at the time?
- Colin Mallett, “I’ll meet you halfway: the migration of the Presnell family to Van Diemen’s Land.” Traces John and Eleanor Presnell’s arrival aboard the Midas and their years at the White Hart Inn. Read the article
- Genealogical Society of Tasmania, Old Anglican Cemetery, Oatlands. The 1983 cemetery survey transcribes Eleanor Amelia Presnell’s headstone, which names Christiana and Thomas as her parents. Read the cemetery survey
- Mallett Family History, Christiana Presnell. A family reconstruction that brings together Christiana and Thomas’s children and traces their connections across the Tasmanian Midlands. View the family history
1808 · Christiana’s baptism.
The register of St Mary, Whitechapel, names Christiana as the daughter of John and Eleanor Presnell and gives the family’s address as Thomas’s Street.
1821 · Arrival of the Midas
The Hobart Town Gazette and Southern Reporter reported that Captain Watson’s ship had arrived the previous day with merchandise and 38 passengers after five months at sea. John Presnell later stated in his 1826 memorial that he arrived aboard the Midas with his family.
1826 · Marriage of Christiana and Thomas
The New Norfolk register records their marriage by banns. Christiana was listed as living at Melville and Thomas at Glenorchy.
1827 · Baptism of John Thomas Presnell
The New Norfolk register records that John Thomas was born on 17 July 1824, names Thomas and Christiana as his parents, and gives the family’s abode as Black Snake.
1834 · Inquest into Eleanor Amelia’s death.
The newspaper reports that the three-year-old daughter of Thomas Presnell was fatally burned at Antill Ponds.
1838 · White Hart Inn auction notice
The notice identifies David Solomon as the tenant at the Antill Ponds inn and names Thomas and John Presnell as occupants of adjoining lots nearby.
1841 · Birth of Martha
Christiana supplied the details of Martha’s birth to the Oatlands district registrar. The entry records Thomas’s occupation as labourer.
1844 · Birth of Mary Ann Dadge
Christiana supplied the details of Mary Ann Dadge’s birth to the Oatlands district registrar. The entry records Thomas’s occupation as labourer.
The Presnell Family of Tasmania
Parents
John Presnell and Eleanor Skelton brought their family to Van Diemen’s Land aboard the Midas in 1821. John kept the White Hart Inn, first at Sorell Springs and later at Antill Ponds, where Eleanor carried on the business after his death.
Husband
Thomas Presnell Jr married Christiana at New Norfolk on 11 July 1826. They lived at Black Snake in the early years of their marriage before moving to the Midlands, where Christiana had spent much of her youth.
Children
My family line continues through William Thomas Presnell, who married Emily Hill at Campbell Town in 1856.
| Name | Date of birth | Place of birth | Date of death |
|---|---|---|---|
| John Thomas Presnell | 17 July 1824 | — | — |
| Harriet Presnell | 15 May 1827 | Black Snake | 1857 |
| William Thomas Presnell | 4 March 1829 | Black Snake | 19 June 1887 |
| Eleanor Amelia Presnell | c. 1830 | — | 2 April 1834 |
| George Frederick Presnell | 23 August 1832 | Sorell Springs | 16 February 1839 |
| Edmund Dadge Presnell | 1835 | Van Diemen’s Land | 29 August 1907 |
| Charles Presnell | 1836 | Van Diemen’s Land | — |
| Edwin Presnell | 1837 | Van Diemen’s Land | 22 September 1902 |
| Samuel Presnell | 9 February 1840 | Oatlands | 11 August 1840 |
| Martha Presnell | 7 September 1841 | Oatlands district | 15 January 1866 |
| Mary Ann Dadge Presnell | 1 January 1844 | Oatlands district | 17 October 1917 |
| Christiana Presnell | 1846 | Van Diemen’s Land | — |
| Diana Dadge Presnell | 1849 | Van Diemen’s Land | — |
| Ellen Elizabeth Presnell | 1852 | Van Diemen’s Land | — |
Birth and arrival. Christiana was baptised at St Mary, Whitechapel, on 9 October 1808. The entry gives the family’s address but no separate birth date, so the profile uses c. 1808. John Presnell’s 1826 memorial says he arrived aboard the Midas with his family. The shipping notice dates the arrival to 12 January 1821, but the passengers it names do not include the Presnells individually. The family profiles follow the same account of John, Eleanor and their children making the voyage together.
John Thomas’s birth, the wedding and the baptism. The New Norfolk baptism register gives John Thomas’s birth as 17 July 1824 and names Thomas and Christiana as his parents. They married on 11 July 1826, and John Thomas was baptised on 17 September 1827. Black Snake is the family’s abode in the baptism entry. His exact birthplace remains open. The marriage register records consent from the older Presnell men. The reasons for the timing of the wedding and baptism are unknown. A visit to the Black Snake Inn is one possible way Christiana and Thomas came to know each other. The suggested first-cousin relationship depends on establishing that their fathers were brothers.
The move to the Midlands. The profile places the move from Black Snake around 1830. George Frederick’s reported birth at Sorell Springs in 1832 and Eleanor Amelia’s inquest at Antill Ponds in 1834 help trace the family’s whereabouts. Whether Christiana and Thomas stayed at either inn remains open. The 1838 auction notice identifies David Solomon as the tenant at the Antill Ponds inn and places Thomas and John Presnell on adjoining lots nearby. Who managed the inn between Eleanor Skelton’s death and Solomon’s tenancy remains uncertain.
Death. The profile follows the reported date of 3 September 1870. The exact place of death, whether at Ross or elsewhere in the Campbell Town district, still needs checking against the original death register.